Centre for Psychiatry Departmental Seminar

You are warmly invited to the next seminar in the series of Centre for Psychiatry Departmental Seminars on 28^th June 2016 at 12.30 in Room G06 (located on the ground floor of the Joseph Rotblat Building, Charterhouse Square campus)
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We are pleased to welcome Dr Mark Freestone Lecturer in Psychiatry (non-clinical), Queen Mary University of London and Senior Researcher, East London NHS Foundation Trust

The title and summary of his presentation is:

Triggers for adverse events in individuals with mental disorders: ‘Just the place for a Snark’?

A significant proportion of forensic mental health research focuses on the identification of “risk factors” for violence or other adverse outcomes for individuals with a mental disorder, which help us to predict which patients will experience that outcome and which will not. However, even the best risk assessments are subject to a ‘glass ceiling’ effect where we can only account for around 75% of the variance in predicting which patients will be violent or relapse into mental illness. Explanations for the remaining 25% remain highly elusive, much like the Snark in Lewis Carroll’s famous poem, which turns out to be something else altogether.

One theory for this effect suggests that risk assessments for violence based on aggregate research cannot account for idiosyncratic ‘triggers’ that act in very close proximity to the violent offence (and hence are hard to predict) and are highly individualised but nevertheless have a causal and overriding impact on the patient’s decision to use violence. In this paper I will summarise existing research into the idea of a ‘trigger’, and present the results of a new, longitudinal study of 513 serious offenders recently released from prison investigating possible triggers for violence. I will also provide some ideas about how we might be able to use the idea of a ‘trigger’ in broader violence and relapse prevention strategies at both the clinical and population levels.

Ciara Byrne

MSc Course Administrator (Tues, Wed, Thurs)
Queen Mary University of London
Centre for Psychiatry
Old Anatomy Building
Charterhouse Square
London EC1M 6BQ
Tel: 020 7882 2013